Coat for use with vehicle safety seat

ABSTRACT

A coat having a thickness of material in a chest region that is thinner than a thickness of material in the sleeves in order to allow a safety harness to be tightened snuggly against the chest of a wearer of the coat. A vest may be worn over the coat to augment the thermal insulating properties of the torso region of the coat when it is not being used with a safety harness. Alternatively, the coat may include a chest cover attached at the sides of the torso region, with the chest cover being opened at the front of the chest to provide access to the chest region for tightening of the safety harness, and closed after the harness is tightened to provide additional thermal insulation. Sleeves of the coat may include an outer material which can be removed for use of the coat in warmer temperatures.

This application claims benefit of the 1 Mar. 2016 filing date of U.S. provisional application No. 62/301,935.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This application relates generally to the field of apparel, and more specifically to a coat configured to allow a child to be safely and warmly secured in a vehicle safety seat.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

It is known to be difficult or impossible to properly secure a child in a car seat when the child is wearing a winter coat because the safety harness of the seat is not tight enough against the child's chest. The National Broadcasting Corporation's Today Show ran a segment of its Rosen Report titled Save My Life which featured crash test video of a child dummy being ejected from a car seat because the dummy was wearing a winter coat in the seat. Most parents prefer not to remove a child's coat before securing the child in a car seat because the child becomes cold. The use of a blanket to cover a coatless child in a car seat is also ineffective because the child may accidently or purposely remove the blanket. Thus, there is an ongoing need to provide a means for safely and warmly securing a child in a vehicle restraint seat.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The invention is explained in the following description in view of the drawings that show:

FIG. 1 is a plan view of a coat according to an embodiment of the instant invention.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view of the coat of FIG. 1 taken along section A-A of FIG. 1 for an embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3 is a sectional view of the coat of FIG. 1 taken along section A-A of FIG. 1 for another embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4 is a sectional view of the sleeve of the coat of FIG. 1 taken along section B-B of FIG. 1 for an embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 5 is an exploded plan view of a clothing ensemble including an embodiment of the coat of FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present inventor has innovatively designed a winter coat that allows a wearer to be safely secured in a vehicle restraint seat while at the same time providing a high degree of thermal insulation for the wearer. This is accomplished with a coat having a relatively thinner material in the chest region of the coat and a relatively thicker material in the sleeves. The thin chest region material allows a restraint harness to be properly tightened against the chest of the wearer, and it provides a degree of thermal insulation for the torso of the wearer. The thicker sleeve material provides a high degree of thermal insulation for the arms of the wearer without interfering with the operation of the safety harness.

It is known that a person's hands and arms are particularly susceptible to feeling cold because they present a higher ratio of surface area to volume than does the torso of the person. The relatively thicker sleeve material of the present invention addresses this physiological reality by keeping the arms particularly warm. While a reduced level of thermal insulation is provided by the chest region of the coat, the wearer is less likely to feel cold because the torso is a high heat generating region of the body, and because the torso remains covered and is protected from drafts by the relatively thinner material of the chest region of the coat. Moreover, the back region of the torso of the wearer remains covered by the coat and is further protected from the environment by the restraint seat itself, thereby further reducing heat loss from the torso. For use of the innovative coat away from the restraint seat in very cold temperatures, a mating vest may be worn over the coat, thereby bringing the total level of thermal insulation around the torso to at least the level of thermal insulation provided by the sleeves. Various embodiments of the invention are described below in more detail.

FIG. 1 illustrates a coat 10 in accordance with embodiments of the present invention. Coat 10 is configured in the usual manner to include a torso portion 12 and a pair of sleeves 14. An optional hood 16 may be permanently affixed to the torso portion 12, or it may be attached with a releasable attachment mechanism 17, such as a zip fastener, buttons, snaps, hook and loop fastener, etc. The torso portion 12 is illustrated as including left and right chest panels 18, 20, attachable to each other by a releasable attachment mechanism 22, such as a zip fastener, buttons, snaps, hook and loop fastener, etc. Some embodiments of the invention may be of the pullover style having a single chest panel lacking a releasable attachment mechanism.

FIG. 2 is a view of the coat 10 taken along section A-A of FIG. 1 for one embodiment of the invention, illustrating the torso portion 12 and one sleeve 14 in cross section. The torso portion 12 includes a chest region 24 and a back region 26 defining a cavity 28 for receiving the torso of a wearer of the coat 10. In an aspect of the invention, thicknesses of the material of construction of the various parts of the coat 10 are selected to optimize its use with a seat restraint device, such as an infant or child's car seat, as well as to optimize the coat's thermal insulating properties and its flexibility for use in a variety of different temperature conditions. As can be seen in FIG. 2, a thickness of a material of construction of at least the chest region 24 of the torso portion 12 is thinner than a thickness of a material of construction of the sleeve 14. In the embodiment of FIG. 2, the chest region 24 and back region 26 are made of the same material and have the same thickness, for example a layer of wool, cotton, flannel, gabardine, polyester, silk, or other material known in the art. The relatively thin material of the chest region 24 ensures that a safety harness portion of a seat restraint (not illustrated) can be snuggly tightened against the chest of the wearer as required for proper functioning of the restraint device. While the relatively thin material of the chest region 24 does provide a degree of thermal insulation, the relatively thicker material of the sleeves 14 provides a higher degree of thermal insulation, which is particularly important for keeping the extremities of the wearer warm. The material of the construction of the sleeve 14 may be a quilted fabric containing an insulating material between inner and outer shell layers, or any other thermally insulating material known or used in the art for winter coats.

FIG. 3 is a view of the coat 10 taken along section A-A of FIG. 1 for another embodiment of the invention. In this embodiment, the back region 26 is formed of a material of construction that is thicker than the material of construction of the chest region 24. The same material of construction used for the sleeve 14 may be used for the back region 26 in some embodiments. Advantageously, the material of construction of the chest region 24 remains thinner than the material of construction of the sleeve 14 so that a safety harness can be snuggly tightened against the chest of the wearer.

The embodiment of FIG. 3 also includes an optional chest cover 30 attached to the torso portion 12 along its side edges 32 to define a space 34 through which a safety harness (not shown) may extend. The chest cover 30 is formed from left and right panels 36, 38 attached together by a releasable attachment mechanism 40, such as a zip fastener, buttons, snaps, hook and loop fastener, etc. When the wearer of the coat 10 of FIG. 3 is positioned into a child safety seat, the attachment mechanism 22 of the chest region 24 is joined together but the attachment mechanism 40 of the chest cover 30 is opened to provide access for tightening the safety harness against the chest region 24. After the safety harness is tightened, the attachment mechanism 40 of the chest cover 30 may be joined over the safety harness to provide optimal thermal insulating performance for the wearer. In an embodiment, the combined thickness of the materials of construction of the chest cover 30 and the chest region 24 is at least as thick as the thickness of the material of construction of the sleeves 14. Since thermal insulating properties are generally proportional to material thickness, an embodiment of the invention may exhibit thermal insulating properties of the combined chest region 24 and chest cover 30 that are at least as effective as the thermal insulating property of the sleeves 14.

FIG. 4 is a sectional view of the sleeve 14 of another embodiment of the coat 10 of FIG. 1 as viewed along section B-B of FIG. 1. The sleeves 14 of this embodiment are formed of an inner material 42 and an overlying outer material 44 such that the thickness of the material of construction of the sleeve 14 is a sum of a thickness of the inner material 42 and a thickness of the outer material 44. In an embodiment, the inner material 42 may be the same as the material of construction of the chest region 24 of the torso portion 12, or the same as the material of construction of both the chest region 24 and the back region 26 of the torso portion 12. Moreover, the outer material 44 may be releasably attached over the inner material 42 so that the coat 10 can be worn with or without the outer material 44 as desired in accordance with the ambient temperature.

FIG. 5 illustrates a clothing ensemble 50 including a coat 52 and a vest 54 configured to be worn over the coat 52. The coat 52 includes a chest region 51 that is formed of material that is thinner than a thickness of the material(s) of the sleeves 53 of the coat 52 in order to ensure proper tightening of a safety harness disposed about the wearer of the coat 52, as described above in relation to the coat 10 of FIG. 1. The ensemble 50 may optionally include a hood 16 which may be either permanently attached to or removable from the coat 52. The ensemble 50 may further optionally include outer sleeve material 56 removably attachable to the coat 52 to cover inner sleeve material 57 to form a sleeve 53. One or more hoods, vests and/or outer sleeves of a variety of colors and/or fabrics may be included in an exemplary ensemble to allow the wearer (or the wearer's mother!) to make any one of a number of different fashion statements.

While various embodiments of the present invention have been shown and described herein, it will be obvious that such embodiments are provided by way of example only. Numerous variations, changes and substitutions may be made without departing from the invention herein. Accordingly, it is intended that the invention be limited only by the spirit and scope of the appended claims. 

The invention claimed is:
 1. A coat comprising: a torso portion; and a pair of sleeves attached to the torso portion; wherein a thickness of a chest region of the torso portion is thinner than a thickness of the sleeves.
 2. The coat of claim 1, further comprising a thickness of a back region of the torso portion is thinner than the thickness of the sleeves.
 3. The coat of claim 1, further comprising the thickness of the back region of the torso portion being the same as the thickness of the sleeves.
 4. The coat of claim 3, further comprising a chest cover attached to the torso portion, wherein a combined thickness of the chest cover and the thickness of the chest region of the torso portion is at least as thick as the thickness of the sleeves.
 5. The coat of claim 1, further comprising a chest cover attached to the torso portion, wherein the chest cover comprises a left panel attached to a left side of the torso portion and a right panel attached to a right side of the torso portion, and further comprising a releasable attachment mechanism for selectively attaching the left and right panels together.
 6. The coat of claim 5, wherein the releasable attachment mechanism comprises a zip fastener.
 7. The coat of claim 1, further comprising a hood attached to the torso portion.
 8. The coat of claim 7, wherein the hood is releasably attached to the torso portion.
 9. The coat of claim 1, wherein the sleeves further comprise an inner material and an overlying outer material such that the thickness of the sleeves comprises a sum of a thickness of the inner material and a thickness of the outer material, and further comprising the outer material being releasably attached over the inner material.
 10. The coat of claim 9, wherein the sleeve inner material is a same material as that of the chest region of the torso portion.
 11. The coat of claim 10, wherein a back region of the torso portion is formed of the same material as that of the sleeve inner material and the chest region of the torso portion.
 12. An ensemble comprising the coat of claim 9, and further comprising a vest.
 13. An ensemble comprising the coat of claim 1, and further comprising a vest.
 14. The ensemble of claim 13, further comprising a hood releasably attachable to the coat. 